Original Air Date: 13 November 2011
Cary: I know a lot of people who weren't anything until they met Kalinda.
Review: Lately, The Good Wife gives me the one thing I hate most about great TV shows: in an effort to show as much of the best characters as possible, the episodes get clustered with events that could be spread out over a larger period of time or things that don't really have any other purpose than annoying the crap out of me, like the blooming friendship between Alicia and Eli's kids or Jackie going through her daughter-in-law's laundry to see - probably - if she has a romantic relationship with someone other than Peter. In fact, I could probably live without any of the family drama, especially the one regarding Grace and her stupid tutor, whom I thought was history by now.
One of the things I like about Alicia is her professionalism. She does her job, though she might not always believe she is doing the right thing. Her questioning the morality of what she is supposed to do felt cliche - the guy who was on the death row raped and killed two girls Grace's age and she judges him by that similarity alone, instead of giving valid reasons other than "my daughter's their age" for being pro death penalty. This is a theme that can easily be developed, instead the writers focused on one small detail of it, ultimately wasting a perfectly good idea.
Moving on to Eli's candidate, I was kind of disappointed by the photo showing him fellating a Santa statue. Is the American public so judgmental as to consider a college prank reason enough for not giving someone their vote? Everyone does stupid things when they're young, why should a State Senate candidate be any different? That's one of my main problems with the US, a country that allows an Austrian actor and former bodybuilder to become Governor, but condemns small mistakes made in one's youth. I had hoped that photo would have actually been something worthy of ridicule, but the whole fuss around it was at least funny. I chose to see it as a parody to the stupidity of the voters, which, if that was the idea behind it, makes me admire this show's creators even more.
A third arc focused on the relationship between Cary and Kalinda, one I really don't want to see become more than what it is now. Dana's involvement was more useful in getting Kalinda to help out Will with his bribing accusations (I absolutely loved that scene between the two) than bringing Cary and Kalinda together. I don't see them fitting with one another and, as I said above, I really don't get Cary's preference for ethnic women. But to each its own.
As always, I liked the lack of focus on the relationship between Will and Alicia. One discrete scene per episode is quite enough, since I'd hate for things to progress to fast when it's clear that neither of them is ready for more. It's still early and Alicia will still have to decide what to do about Peter's upcoming campaign. The Good Wife 3x07: Executive Order 13224 Back to Season 3
